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Comment by coldtea | Hacker News Reader

>While I wish such leader can speak for values like democracy or human rights, it is just not possible to happen.

Why would he have any great insight on "democracy or human rights" compared the average population? Because he wrote successful software?

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That is such a true remark. I’ve always been shocked by the unsufferable ego one needs to have to feel authorized to give public statements on complex global issues or life advices.

Yeah we live in an age where professional athletes, musicians and celebrities play an integral role in shaping global socioeconomic policy.

What the fuck could possibly go wrong

Or worse, career politicians and career policy advisors. That is, people totally removed from any implication of their policies for others, and usually far removed (economically, socially, culturally) from the population they decide for.

I think the ancient Athenian democracy had it right: some law-making bodies should be filled by lottery -- akin to juries or the draft.

> Why would he have any great insight on "democracy or human rights" compared the average population? Because he wrote successful software?

Linux project itself has been showing how people can collaborate so well. Obviously politics is also something that requires people to work with each other. It is hard to say if he, as a maintainer of this project, has insights of human collective behavior in general.

> Linux project itself has been showing how people can collaborate so well.

Yeah, lets just ignore thousands of years of civilization doing that long before some Finnish guy made a software.

I don't think the parent is suggesting that Linus is the only good example of a leader of a major collaborative initiative. Just that he happens to be one good example.

Silly people want silly rolemodels? /s

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